The First Year
by IronicNarwhal
Summary: A lot can happen in twelve months.


They get married in July, six years to the day after they meet, and have a two-week honeymoon around Levi's hometown in France. Even though Levi left ten years ago, and his mother has since moved to a different city, people still recognize him there, and call him _Revaille_. Eren knows that the name he calls his new husband by is actually the anglicized version of his French given name, but it's strange and beautiful and it feels like a new layer of depth has been added to this amazing, complicated man that Eren is ridiculously in love with.

* * *

"We need a bigger apartment."

"Um." Eren glances behind him, to where Levi is sitting at the two-seater bar that marks off their kitchenette, half-dressed and eating dry toast. "What's wrong with this one?" It's a one-bedroom deal that's been perfectly fine for the both of them for three years. He's lost as to why being married changes things.

"What I mean by bigger apartment is we need to find a bigger studio."

"Why didn't you say bigger studio, then? We can just sell the space downstairs and look for a bigger one downtown." Eren agrees that the studio downstairs has gotten too small for their growing martial arts club. But he still has no idea why the apartment they're living in now is problematic.

"I'm not going to live halfway across town from my goddamn studio. Also, this neighborhood is going to shit and you know it. The parents have been bitching to me and you know how much I hate listening to the parents bitch."

Eren sighs and turns off the sink, bowing his head over the unwashed dishes. "We just got married. We're running a little short on resources. I can't ask my mom for more money. I just can't, baby; Mikasa's still in college. And if we move, we'll lose people, and profit will go down for a few months, and who's to say that the club will be successful in a different area?"

"Tch. You worry too much."

"Someone has to, don't they?"

He hears Levi sigh and the kitchen chair scoot back, then feels Levi come up behind him. He stays at a distance—because Levi is always at least somewhat distant, emotionally and physically—but sets his hand on Eren's shoulder. "You're too young to worry about shit like this. Things will even out."

Eren rolls his eyes. There are seven years and some change between them and Levi is always so quick to remind him.

"Besides, we only have one bedroom, and your idiot friends are always over—"

"Excuse me, Hanji uses the couch at least twice as much as any of my friends!"

"—and I suppose it's about time we get our shit together and buy a place with a guest room and an actual kitchen and, you know, room for more people. Just in case."

"Our friends are fine staying here."

"Eren, Christ, that's not what I mean. I'm talking about…_little people_. Who need space to run around and a room to themselves and toys to play with and space _for_ those toys."

Eren's head snaps up and he turns around sharply, because kids are a thing they've only talked about once or twice and the general consensus was that they were a distant possibility and that they would cross that bridge when they came to it. Eren says, "Children?"

"Not right now, idiot. Someday, though. Probably. And I don't want to get stuck in the shitty housing market when the time comes. We should look now." Levi shrugs and steps away. "Besides, we really do need that extra studio space."

The next day, Eren starts looking.

* * *

The day they move in, they find two kittens in the alley behind their new building.

"Aw," Eren says, leaning down to them.

"They're probably feral," Levi says, and stays an entire six feet away. He hasn't recovered from the heart attack he experienced upon first laying eyes on what he thought were rats. "Don't touch them, idiot."

Eren shakes his head. "They're too young for that. I wonder where mother is?"

"Wandering around somewhere getting pregnant again," Levi says, and grabs Eren by the upper arm to get him up off his knees. "Come on. We've got unpacking to do. They're…they'll be fine." Despite his tugging, Eren stays there, kneeling next to the two black and white kittens that, in turn, huddle together in the corner as far away as possible from the man who must look like an absolute giant to them.

"They look really sad."

"Actually, they look scared, because you're fourteen times their size and they probably think you're going to eat them." He tugs again and adds, "Come on, we can't do anything about it right now. Once we're moved in, if they're still here, we'll figure something out. But they'll probably be gone, or worse, their mother will have shown up. I'm not letting you get bitten by a feral cat. A rabies shot would cost way too much money."

All Eren hears when Levi says things like that is _I worry about you_, so Eren enjoys it because Levi never actually says it.

When they come back out three hours later, the kittens are still there.

* * *

Their hallway has become a kitten playpen.

"They're so cute," murmurs Eren, on his knees and leaning over the gate like some toddler trying to peer into a room where he's not allowed.

"They're little dirt-making machines, is what they are," Levi mutters, watching the kittens wrestle. "I'm not cleaning that fucking litter box, Eren. I'm serious."

"I know you love them already," Eren murmurs, and wiggles his fingers down into the pen. They're attracted to the shine off of his wedding ring, and one of them starts gnawing on his knuckle. All Eren does is chuckle. "They're kind of like you. Tiny and confrontational and grumpy in the morning." He makes kissing noises at them while Levi scowls.

He steps over Eren's feet, which stick out behind him from under his knees, and leans over to brace himself on the gate. "I hate you."

"No you don't," Eren murmurs, and bends his head backwards for a kiss. "What should we name them?"

"Smelly and Stupid."

"No," Eren laughs against his lips. "I don't think so. What about Erd and Auruo?"

"No, let's not name them after anyone we know," Levi mutters. "Besides, I don't like either of them enough to name a cat after them. Even though they do sometimes look like kittens with their idiotic flailing."

"That's what I was thinking."

Erd and Auruo are black belts. They're actually more advanced than Eren, although being married to the man that owns the club kind of gives Eren an advantage over the two of them all the same. Their movements are graceful in a way that Eren could never hope to be, but Levi calls them clumsy and Eren just likes to go along with the joke.

"One of them is a girl," Levi adds. "So one of them has to have a girl name."

"How do you know? I can't tell."

"I used to work in a pet store. You learn things."

Eren smiles up at him. "I never knew that. That's neat."

Levi shrugs and says, "It's just something I did in high school," even though what he wants to say is _there are plenty of things you don't know, just because I don't know how to tell you_. Of course, he doesn't know how to tell Eren that, either.

* * *

"EREN! I heard you had _kittens_?"

Sometimes Eren wishes he never would have met Levi, simply because then he may never have met Hanji Zoe. She was Levi's roommate when they met six years ago (Eren was still in high school—if you mention it to anybody you face death) and ever since she's been a constant, annoying, vaguely threatening presence on the periphery of Eren's life.

"Um," Eren says. "It's…the morning. Do you sleep?"

Hanji just laughs, which Eren thinks he can translate into _No, are you kidding? I'm a mutant with no need for sleep or nourishment that does not come in the form of diet coke or rice cakes._

"Kittens?" Hanji drawls, when Eren apparently doesn't react for too long for her liking.

"You can't have one," Eren says defensively. "We've already decided to keep both of them." By that, of course, Eren means that he's set his mind to convincing Levi to keep them both through any means necessary, including various sexual acts and offers of cleaning.

"I just wanna see them," Hanji whines at length, and Eren sighs expansively before allowing her in the apartment. Levi is downstairs with the contractors who are cleaning up the studio, getting it ready for the grand reopening of Shiganshina Mixed Martial Arts Club. Eren decided early on that he would stay out of Levi's hair.

Eren sighs. "Okay. Fine."

Hanji spends literally an hour on the floor with the kittens, giggling hysterically. When Levi gets back he stares at her and solemnly asks, "You let her in our house?"

"She kind of barged in, actually."

"What are their names?" Hanji asks Levi, with one kitten clinging to either side of her chest.

"They don't have them yet," Levi says. "Why? Do you have suggestions?"

"I couldn't help but notice that they're…fierce," Hanji says, shrugging. "And they enjoy biting. There was a fierce warrior known for the murder and cannibalism of over one-thousand people. His name was Sawney Bean. Therefore, you're Sawney," she points to the boy, whom is only readily recognizable by the triangular marking on his face. Pointing to the other one, she adds, "And you're Bean."

"Uh," Eren says while Levi snaps, "We're not naming our kittens after a cannibal!"

Three weeks later, they cave and buy the cats tags that identify them as Sawney and Bean.

* * *

Levi gets quiet on the High Holy Days. It's not anything he hasn't done before, but Eren had kind of been hoping that things would be different, considering they were only married three months ago.

"Can we, uh, talk?" Eren mumbles, sitting down at the kitchen table. "About anything? Nothing specific, just…I feel like we haven't…talked?" They haven't said more than four sentences at a time to each other since the day before Rosh Hashanah, but he's not going to get into specifics.

"These days are for reflection, you know," Levi mutters, staring into the depths of his tea. "Asking forgiveness for what you've done. You're Jewish now. It's something we do."

"Does that mean we can't fucking talk?" Eren demands. "Because we're husbands now. It's something we do."

"Some of us have a whole lot more to reflect on, Eren," Levi snaps. "I'm sorry I can't indulge your constant need for attention right now."

"Fuck you," Eren says, stands up and walks out.

* * *

He comes back in sometime around six o'clock, right before dinner. Levi is still in one place, although Eren can only hope he's moved in the five hours he's been gone.

"I'm sorry," Levi says.

"It's alright," Eren mutters.

* * *

The uncomfortable silence continues until the day after Yom Kippur. On the day itself, they go to synagogue and pray. It's the only time of year that Levi, and by extension Eren, goes out of his way to go to synagogue. They're both dressed in white, both hungry and thirsty, and both uncomfortably sticky after a day of not bathing.

When they get home, they stand on opposite sides of the kitchen and stare. Eren drinks a tall glass of water.

"I suppose I should ask your forgiveness, as well. Considering I've been asking God to forgive me for days now."

Eren smirks a bit. "Yeah. But it's okay. I get it."

"You don't," Levi mumbles, "But that's my fault as well, I suppose. There are just…some things I can't tell you right now. Do you understand? Someday, I will. I just…I can't, right now. I can hardly stand the idea of God knowing what I've done."

It's rare that Levi talks about God, because half the time Eren isn't sure Levi still believes He exists. He's always been aware that Levi went through shit when he was younger. He's just never been sure of what, and Levi's never been forthcoming.

"I understand," Eren murmurs, even though he doesn't. Then he lets it go, because there's no use dwelling on it. He finishes his water and tells Levi that he's going to take a shower.

Levi joins him and they break all their fasts at once.

* * *

"Morning," Eren says, getting down on the floor with Levi at eight AM and contorting himself into a poor imitation of the position his husband is folded into. Morning yoga is something that Levi has done the entire time Eren has known him, and he's watched him enough to pick up the basics.

"You're joining me?" Levi mumbles into his calf. He's sitting on the floor, one leg folded to himself while the other extends out to the left at as wide of an angle as he can manage, which considering it's Levi, is practically a straight line. With his head tucked down against the extended leg, it really looks like he should be in pain. But he's not. He's actually pretty comfortable, it would seem. Eren dips his head as close as possible to his thigh, although he has to stop far before his forehead touches like Levi.

"Yeah," Eren mumbles.

"Alright," Levi says. "Just keep up."

From there Levi sits up and tucks his knee under his chin, then folds the extended leg in, places the other foot over the now-bent knee, lodges his upward facing knee into his armpit and turns as far back as he can. Eren tries his best to mirror it, although it hurts.

"You're doing it wrong, _mon cœur_."

Eren smiles into his knee. Levi is in a good mood. He rarely calls Eren by that endearment. Eren has never bothered to find out what it means, mostly because if it means something like _idiot_, he doesn't want to know. He wants to retain the illusion that it might actually mean something nice like _sweetheart _or _darling_.

"We all can't be ridiculously flexible."

"Usually you enjoy my particular skill set."

Eren snorts and unfolds himself, watches Levi switch to the other side of his body and recontort into the mirror of the original position. He raises onto his knees and waits and watches Levi gets into that one position that he loves so much—one foot firmly on the ground, other leg raised so his heal touches his bum, arms extended high above his head. He's completely stable. Eren would be wobbling like crazy, but Levi doesn't even have to shift his foot to stay balanced.

He scoots over until his shoulder is under Levi's knee. Levi rests some of his weight onto his shoulder, presses the opposite hand into his other shoulder.

"Hey," Eren says, pressing his cheek into Levi's thigh.

"Hey."

"Do you know you're sexy?"

Levi smirks. "I had a vague inkling, yeah."

Dipping his fingers into Levi's waistband, he says, "I love you."

"You, too," murmurs Levi. He says the word _love_, actually vocalizes it, on very rare occasions. The last time was their wedding night and he said it so many times that Eren thinks he's spent his _I love you_ quota for the first three years of their marriage, at least. It doesn't bother him, really. Eren says it enough for the both of them, and he knows that Levi says it in unorthodox ways. When he does things like make sure Eren remembers to eat, or bitches about cleaning up after Eren while he organizes his nightstand.

"Can you keep yourself upright like this, do you think?" Eren asks, because suddenly the idea of fellating Levi while he stands with one knee braced against Eren's shoulder is literally the hottest thing he can imagine right now.

"I swear, all you think about is sex." Of course Levi knows what's going through his mind.

Eren laughs and pulls Levi's pajama bottoms down until they are held down by the peaks of Levi's hip bones. "Could be. But can you?"

"I think so, yeah," murmurs Levi. In response, Eren grins.

* * *

Eren dresses up as a cowboy for Halloween. Levi puts on a pair of cat ears and black jeans and claims to be a panther. They go over to Hanji's for some kind of Halloween party which involves them and half of their friends getting drunk and sitting around in a circle and bitching about life.

They're two of only four people who escape from Hanji's house anytime before three o'clock in the morning (The other two being Mikasa and Armin, who have classes in the morning and aren't heavy drinkers anyway) and they return to their apartment, still vaguely tipsy and in high spirits.

Levi walks into the bedroom first, Eren following, and when he stops in front of the closet, Eren wraps his arms around Levi's waist and whispers, "Heeeere, kitty kitty," into his ear.

"Please tell me it's not the cat ears that are turning you on right now," Levi says, even as he turns around to wrap his arms around Eren's neck. Each of Eren's index fingers loops into one of the belt loops on his pants.

"My _very sexy_ husband is in some _very sexy_ jeans right now, so you tell me," Eren murmurs, and Levi knows that Eren knows he's hard. As if to prove the point, Eren takes the cat ears and throws them into the closet, where they won't be found until next Halloween.

They fuck on the floor and Levi might, _might_ just say, "Ride 'em cowboy," at some point.

Might.

* * *

Trying to fit an entire Jaeger-Ackerman family Thanksgiving into his and Levi's small apartment is interesting, especially considering the first night of Hanukkah coincides. Eren's parents and Mikasa come over at noon and start cooking, with Eren's help, and at five people start arriving.

Eren is in a strange position wherein he's friends with a lot of people who don't really have families of their own, or at least not those who celebrate Thanksgiving. Armin was raised by his grandfather, who died right after they graduated high school. Jean (Although Eren wouldn't consider the asshole his friend, his mother continually invites him to Thanksgiving) and his father don't get along. Sasha's parents aren't _from_ the US and couldn't care less about Thanksgiving. Connie's parents live in Los Angeles and, as a person of the starving student type, he doesn't have the resources to return home every Thanksgiving. Annie, Bertholdt, and Reiner…well, Eren isn't sure what goes on with them. He's known them for awhile but he's never quite been able to figure out what it is that keeps them from going home, wherever home might be for them. Ymir's parents are Swedish and, like Sasha's parents, don't really care; Christa's parents don't approve of Ymir. Marco was raised by his sister, and his sister is now married with a family of her own and lives in Arizona.

"When did you get so many friends?" Levi mutters to him, during an odd moment when they're alone in the kitchen.

"I've always had them," Eren says, shrugging. With the exception of Bert, Annie and Reiner, he's known all of these people since high school. "You just never noticed."

"Tch."

Eren kisses Levi's cheek and goes back to shredding potatoes for the latkes. Not necessarily a traditional Thanksgiving dish, but necessary for the circumstances all the same. It's the first thing Eren learned to make when he decided to convert, around the time he graduated college.

Hanji arrives with enough kosher wine to drown a horse (For _Kiddush, _she informs, although even with all these people they'd never need so many bottles for _Kiddush_) and sets them down before retreating to torment the kittens, wishing the appropriate people happy Thanksgivings and Hanukkahs as she goes.

Levi's other friend from college, Erwin, arrives sometime after sunset, and right before they sit down to eat. He's a quiet, somewhat mysterious person that Eren really doesn't know a lot about yet, despite being acquainted with him for nigh on four years at this point. It's strange, because if pressed he could probably tell you what kind of toothpaste Hanji uses, but he barely knows Erwin's last name.

It's Smith. He thinks.

"Nice of you to join us," Levi says, raising an eyebrow. "You never gave me a straight answer on whether you were even going to show up."

"Other possible plans fell through," Erwin informs, taking a seat between Hanji and Armin.

Levi rolls his eyes. Then, looking at Eren, says, "Say _Kiddush_."

"I, uh…"

"You know it," Levi murmurs, "so say it."

So Eren works his way clumsily through the prayers, and they pass the wine around and everyone drinks. Even though, with the exceptions of Hanji and Erwin, they've probably never done this before, they drink. They say _amen_ in the right places.

He's never felt so…appreciated, he thinks is the right word, or _accepted_, because six years ago he wasn't Jewish, wasn't married to a Jew and still celebrated Christmas and probably couldn't tell you what _Kiddush _was if his life depended on it. Now he is all of that, and not once has someone asked him if he thought he was really making a good decision.

It feels really, amazingly good.

(…okay so maybe one time, _one time_, Mikasa asked him if he was sure he wanted to _marry a hobbit with an anger management problem_, but that was only once and she apologized soon after.)

* * *

"I got you a present."

The house is quiet, it's late, and everyone has left. It's them, standing in front of the menorah, which in turn is set up in their living room window. The light of the two lit candles reflects off Eren's wedding ring in a way that's slightly mesmerizing.

"You didn't have to," Eren murmurs, even as he holds his own present for Levi in his hands.

"I know."

They exchange boxes and stare at each other for a minute, each waiting for the other to open their gift. Finally, Levi moves first. Eren can tell he's momentarily confused, mostly because on the surface it looks like Eren has gotten him a photo album. When he starts flipping through it, and realizes what's contained inside, the dawning comprehension makes Eren smile.

"When did you…?"

"We were in France for two weeks," Eren mumbles, shrugging. "I got bored. And, um, my phone's camera is pretty good." He watches as Levi flips through a few pages, full of pictures of his hometown, the landscapes and the buildings and the people. "I know you miss it. You've never explicitly mentioned it, but I know that you wish you could get back there more often."

Levi glances at him from under his fringe. "I came to America on my own, you know. I don't regret it."

"I know, that's not what I'm implying. I just…now you can look at them, instead of just remembering them when you get homesick. I know you still get homesick sometimes." Eren stares at him, hesitantly, thinking the only thing he's managed to do is stick his foot down his throat. Then Levi smiles—small, barely there, but Eren sees it.

"Thank you," he murmurs. "These are beautiful. I never knew you could take pictures like this."

"They're not really…I just pointed and shot," Eren mutters, scratching the back of his neck. "It's probably…the phone, y'know."

"Most camera phones take shit photos," Levi mutters, and adds, "Obviously, you've got a natural talent, Eren."

That means a lot, coming from Levi. Coming from anyone. All through high school, Eren was that kid that was good at some things, not great at anything, had no real talent, and was told repeatedly. By teachers, by peers, by everyone. At this point in his life, he's stopped actively trying to figure out what he's really good at, accepting the fact that there isn't anything.

"Thank you," Eren whispers, and it's a mystery to him how he can still be timid in front of this man who he's been with since he was eighteen, who he's been married to for four months now.

In turn, Levi presents him with his own gift. Eren opens it, eager for the distraction.

"Oh my god," he mutters.

* * *

"Ready?"

Eren glances at Petra, who he never even _knew _worked a bungee-jumping site. She's another one of those friends of Levi who hovers on the perimeter of their life together. She's short, and redheaded, and looks amused at the way Levi stares at him disapprovingly even though this was his gift to Eren.

"Yeah," Eren says, belly already a flurry of butterflies.

Levi stands far back and mutters, "Dumb adrenalin junkie."

Eren grins. "I love you too, baby! See you at the bottom."

"Oh my god. Ugh."

With one last smile, Eren turns towards the spring board, walks out and glances at Petra for the signal before he jumps.

It's like falling and flying at the same time and his heart stops for a second when the ground come too close for comfort before the cord pulls him back by his left ankle. He whoops, thinks he can hear Levi yelling that he's an idiot, to stop throwing himself around like that. The rushing in his ears, the blood pumping through his body, the feeling of being completely and utterly _alive_. The wind whizzing past his hair and the feeling of weightlessness as he flips in mid-air.

He hangs there for awhile afterwards as Petra works her way down. She and Levi step onto the mat and Levi stares at him for a second and he looks like he did when Eren met him, arms crossed with eyebrow raised and sunglasses on the tip of his nose.

"Enjoy yourself?" he asks.

"Hell yeah," Eren says. "I feel amazing." Feels like he could conquer the world, or run twenty laps, or fuck a certain husband of his into the mattress when they get home.

Levi kisses him as he's hanging upside-down, and Petra snaps his souvenir picture at that point.

Eren frames the picture and puts it on his night stand next to their wedding portrait.

* * *

"Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday dear _Leviiiiii—_"

"Shut the _fuck_ up," Levi snaps from under his pillow. There are little feet walking up and down his thigh. Eren has dropped one of the cats onto his leg. "What the actual fuck?"

"Say happy birthday to Daddy, Bean," Eren says, in spite of knowing—probably _because_ he knows—that Levi hates it when people refer to themselves as their pets' parents. He shoves the all-black face of their female kitten into Levi's face. She mews pitifully.

"You're holding her wrong," Levi grumbles, turning his face just enough to see Eren out of his periphery. "She's going to bite you. I won't feel sorry for you." Speaking of, he can feel Sawney's sharp claws biting into his leg. "Eren. Get Sawney off of me before he cripples me."

Eren heaves a put-upon sigh, but dutifully lifts the fat mound of hair that is Sawney off Levi's leg. He leaves Bean on the bed, to nestle against Levi's chest and close her eyes and begin to purr. Levi rubs behind her ears, because she's his favorite, and props himself up on one elbow to watch Eren sit on the bed, one leg folded under himself and the other hanging off the bed, cat on his bent knee.

"Happy birthday," Eren says again, a sparkle in his eyes that means he's up to something. "How many is it now?"

"Twenty-seven."

"Come on, Levi. You've been turning twenty-seven for three years now. How many birthdays?"

Levi's scowl intensifies. "You do the math, brat. What's twenty-seven plus three?"

"I wanna hear _you_ say it."

"Well then you're shit out of luck, aren't you?" Levi throws a pillow at Eren, but his husband just laughs. "It's my fucking birthday, so I get to do what I want. What I want is three more hours of sleep and for you and the cats to _vacate_, and to never be asked how old I am ever again." He realizes how self-pitying it sounds, but at the moment he doesn't care.

He's thirty fucking years old and he feels every bit of it.

"Birthdays are stupid," grumbles Levi, as Eren takes the cats and puts them out of the room. Eren himself, however, remains. Levi has mixed feelings about this. "You'll start to think so when you get as old as I am, too. Isn't twenty-two the age where you stop gaining human rights based on how old you are? Can you drink yet?"

"You're so hilarious," Eren mutters, rolling his eyes. He comes up on Levi, stands next to the bed and tilts his head to the side. "Why are you acting like it's the end of the world? You're thirty. So what. You could totally live another seventy years with how ridiculously healthy you are."

"It's the principal of the thing," Levi says, and now he's definitely in a passion, hands folded over his chest as if he's already died and been put in his coffin. "Not only am I closer to death, but my golden years are almost up. Soon I'll start going grey and get fat and wrinkly and acquire a flatulence problem. And how did I spend my last six years of being young and carefree? Cavorting around with a pubescent brat and risking pedophilia charges." Glancing at Eren, he reminds him, "You're lucky that your mother likes me," and not for the first time.

For a second, Eren just stares at him. Then he raises an eyebrow and says, "Wow. I don't even know where to start. Flatulence problem?"

"It happened to Erwin."

"You mean his constipation? Which is an entirely made-up rumor that, if I remember correctly, _you_ started?" Quickly, Eren shakes his head. "Okay. Never mind. Let's talk about the fact that you were _never_ young and carefree, that you've _always_ acted like the next apocalypse is upon us and it's your sole responsibility to prepare us for it. Also, I was seventeen when we met. You were twenty-four. It's not as creepy as you make it sound."

"It's pretty creepy."

Eren tilts his head back and forth and wiggles his hand as if to say _somewhat_. Then he adds, "What you said about my mother is true, though. She likes you better than me, sometimes."

Levi smirks. "Can you blame her?"

"See, when you say things like that, I never know if you're insulting me or stroking your own ego."

"They're not mutually exclusive, you know."

"This is true."

Levi sighs and lowers his arms, lets Eren lay down next to him. They stare at the ceiling together. It's weirdly textured and has a pattern that Levi finds irritating, but they stare at it all the same. Eventually, Levi says, "You're twenty-two."

"Almost twenty-three."

"Your birthday is in _March_. It's _December_."

"What's your point?"

Deciding that he's going to take that as Eren asking for his original point, and not the point of 'you're way farther away from twenty-three than you seem to think you are,' Levi sighs and says, "You married so young."

"The way you say that makes it sound like you didn't."

"That's because I didn't." Levi rolls his head to the side and looks at Eren, who's still resolutely looking at the ceiling. That, more than anything, tells Levi that Eren knows exactly what he's trying to say. "Twenty-nine is a normal age to get married. Twenty-two is _not_. And seventeen is _sure as hell_ not the age most people meet their future spouses at."

He can hear the hesitation on Eren's breath as he starts to respond, stops, and finally says, "Again, what's your point?"

Levi starts to respond, but obviously Eren's question was rhetorical, because he just continues.

"Because I don't care. Really, I don't. I've been in love with you since I was seventeen. That might change one day, I don't know. But I'm not betting on it. You're the only person I've ever wanted to be with so badly that I…that I can't imagine my life without you. I don't even know what I did the first seventeen years of my life."

"That's probably unhealthy."

"I'm _serious_, Levi! Could you just listen to me for a second?" he rolls over, straddles Levi's hips. "I don't even fucking care that I was seventeen when we met, and eighteen when we started dating, and twenty-two when we got married. Really, I don't. All it means is that I've gotten the privilege of having the love of my life _in_ my life for longer than most people. That…that fifty years from now, when we're both old and grey, I really, _actually_ won't remember what it was like without you. I'll just have all of these memories of you, of us together, of what we've done and what we've accomplished. Do you get it?"

Levi pushes his face into Eren's shoulder so that his face can't be seen. He nods. "Yeah."

Then the moment is broken, because Eren's mother calls and wishes them a merry Christmas, and asks if they're going to be over for dinner, and _it's Levi's birthday today, right? Happy birthday, Levi! Did he hear me? Okay. Does it bother him that his birthday is on Christmas? Well, I guess it wouldn't, he's Jewish. You are too, I know. You remembered that it's his birthday, right Eren? You remembered that it's your husband's birthday?..._

Eren looks at Levi with an appeal for help in his eyes. Levi gets out of bed and makes coffee.

* * *

"Ugh, faster…oooh yeah, just like that."

"Good?"

"Yeah…uh, uh, uh…oh _fuck_, right there."

"There?"

"_Yes_. Oh _fuck_…"

"HAPPY NEW YEAR!"

Eren and Levi fall off the couch. Eren has enough forethought to grab the blanket and pull it around them as they fall, just to protect what little modesty wasn't tarnished by Hanji barreling into their apartment and seeing what she saw.

"HANJI!" Levi screams, "I told you to come at _ten_! It is nine thirty, I fucking checked!"

"It's not proper decorum to have sex less than an hour before your visitors are planned to arrive," Hanji counters, eyebrow raised. She kind of has a point. It was Eren's fault, anyway. "I suppose I should have expected this, though…newly weds and all! Don't they need one orgasm a day to live?"

Eren tells the ceiling, "I'm gonna kill you."

"Levi won't let you."

"Levi will _help_ him," Levi counters.

* * *

Eren and Mikasa meet for lunch on Tuesdays. It's a thing they've done since Eren moved out and Mikasa started going to college. Things haven't changed, even now that Mikasa is preparing to graduate and go onto medical school.

They meet outside the hall where Mikasa has her noon class on Tuesdays, hug and exchange the typical how-are-yous. They walk arm-in-arm down the street, and Mikasa catches Eren up on the goings-on at home, because she still lives there. She's not an entire year younger than Eren, but enough that she was always a year behind him in school. She plans to move out when she graduates, because she hates continuing to live at home. She thinks she's bothersome on their parents. Eren knows she's not.

"So how are things with the hobbit?" Mikasa asks. Eren long ago stopped trying to get her to stop calling Levi that. Mostly because he realized, at some point, that it was more a joke for her than anything now.

"Fine," Eren says. "Better now that he's stopped moping about turning thirty, Jesus Christ."

Mikasa chuckles lowly, and they walk silently to their typical haunt of a Tuesday afternoon, a brasserie a few blocks up from main campus. It's a pleasant, twenty-minute walk that gives him time to clear his head and think and just pleasantly coexist with his sister, like they did through so much of their childhood.

Well, perhaps not exactly like. People who knew them as children seem to always mention that they were weirdly codependent, especially for step-siblings. Eren figures it has something to do with them having been through similar situations—Mikasa's mom dying, Eren's dad up and leaving one day, almost as if he'd died. They've become a lot more independent since then, obviously, but this whole once a week lunch thing is one of the things in Eren's life that he's come to rely on to keep him sane.

"I need to tell you something," Mikasa says, when they've sat down.

Eren stares at her warily. "What?"

"I'm seeing someone."

"That's great," Eren says, "but why did you say it in the tone of voice I imagine you'd use if you were saying 'I have cancer'?"

"Because you know the person…and you won't approve."

"…Okay."

"It's Jean."

"Ah. Okay. Um…" Eren looks down, at the table between his hands, and in spite of himself says, "Why?" because Jean has had a thing for Mikasa since high school, but never has she shown any real interest. Eren honestly thought that entire thing had been left behind when they all graduated, one of the many stories to populate halls of their old stomping grounds. Four years later, it's apparently going to rear its ugly head in a way that Eren never expected—because, come on, he never expected Mikasa to actually tell the idiot _yes_.

Mikasa shrugs. "Because…there was no reason not to. It's nice to have someone who cares about you, and who you care about in that way. I don't think it's going to last, but it's fun right now."

Again, despite not really wanting to know the answer, Eren blurts, "Why don't you think it will last? What's the point?"

With a small smile, Mikasa says, "Not everyone meets their husband on the first try, Eren. Sometimes you have to be with people who are fun to be around, but not necessarily people you can see yourself with forever, you know? I can't see myself with Jean forever. But for right now, it's nice."

"Well…as long as you're happy, I suppose."

Mikasa stares at him for a moment as though waiting for the other shoe to drop. Finally, after a long moment spent in silence, she says, "Thank you, Eren. That's very mature of you."

"I can be sometimes, you know. Mature."

All Mikasa does is smile.

* * *

"My sister is dating a horse-faced asshole," groans Eren.

Levi raises an eyebrow. "Jean?"

"Do we know any other horse-faced assholes?"

Rolling his eyes, Levi says, "It won't last."

* * *

"Alright, everyone. That's today's class. Thank you."

"Thank you, Master Levi!" chorus the six- and seven-year-olds that make up Levi's junior beginner's class. Eren sits cross-legged at Levi's feet, in front of the forty children they teach on Wednesdays. The junior classes all run on a nine-month cycle, with the goal being that everyone who joins at the beginning of one cycle will be able to move onto the next class up at the beginning of the next cycle. The kids have to climb three ranks before they can do that, and this class is nearly ready to move on, it being March and the cycle being up in May.

It's hard to keep track of all the classes, sometimes, and everyone's progress. There are forty kids in the junior beginners, and forty more in the intermediate. The same goes for the young adult groups of the same. The advanced groups have about twenty each—because for some reason, a lot of kids start to find it just too hard after a certain rank—and after the advanced, those in the juniors and those in the young adult mix to form one, large group focused more on retention than gaining skill. They go to competitions twice a cycle, and usually place.

Then there is the adult group. Twenty or so people who meet three times a week for rigorous training in preparation for becoming masters in their own right. Eren is still very much a student in that group, but for the kids, he's a teacher.

Once all the kids have flooded out of the studio space, Eren goes around and closes the blinds to the large, floor-to-ceiling windows looking out on the street, folds up the table they use for sign-in, bags all the pads, and drags all but one mat into a corner.

"Good work today," Levi says, coming up behind him at the edge of the mat.

"Thank you," Eren says, and steps onto the mat.

Levi pulls a wooden knife out of the bag that they keep carefully out of reach during the classes with the little kids, sends the bag skidding across the floor, and steps onto the mat with Eren. They bow to each other, just as a courtesy because there's no grand-master breathing down their necks as there is sometimes when they spar in class. Even Levi has to answer to a superior sometimes.

"Ready?" Levi asks.

"Yeah."

Eren settles into the right stance. They make eye contact for a moment, then Levi moves. He takes one step forward, pushing off his right leg, and lifts the knife high up in an over-hand attack. Eren grabs his wrist, twists his arm around behind his back and sets him off balance, pulls him far backwards, twists his arm until he can't keep a hold on the knife anymore, takes the knife and holds it against his neck.

"Die," Eren says, as is customary to announce a fatal blow, and they stand there for a second, suspended.

"Not bad," Levi says eventually, and lets himself fall backwards. Still on the floor, because he likes to practice counter-attacks from every angle, he adds, "Your turn."

Eren comes underhanded, aiming for the stomach. Levi grabs his wrist, holds it high up above his head, sweeps his foot under Eren's ankle and forces him to fall back, straddles his stomach and pulls the knife across Eren's throat.

"I'll never get over how fast you can do that," Eren mutters. "I was standing and then I wasn't."

"Practice," Levi says, and lets the knife fall to the side.

"I know," Eren mutters, and pulls Levi down easily for a kiss. With one hand, he cups his hand over Levi's bum. With the other, he gropes for the knife.

There Levi goes, just for a split-second, and Eren has a dawning sense of failure before Levi's back, and there's his knee on Eren's chest, and there's the fake blade against his neck, and there are Levi's eyes with a look of appraisal in them.

"Hah. Nice try, brat."

Eren grins, grabs him by the thigh—he cannot believe Levi would leave himself open to overbalancing like that, to be honest, and he's half-convinced it's a trap even as he yanks Levi's knee away from his chest, rolls them over, and pins Levi to the mat by his hips.

Then the blade is against his neck again, and he realizes what he forgot.

"It's advisable, _mon cœur_," Levi says, with a raised eyebrow, "to disarm your opponent before exposing vulnerable areas to them." With the blade, he points to Eren's neck, his chest, his stomach, his groin.

"I could tell you the same," Eren murmurs, tracing his hands up the insides of Levi's thighs. It should probably bother him that sparing is practically synonymous with foreplay to him at this point. It doesn't, really. "Can we go upstairs?"

"Three more sets," Levi says, "and then I'll let you fuck me here. If you want."

"I love you," Eren mumbles into his thigh.

* * *

"Happy birthday, brat."

There's a cat on his face. Levi actually put one of the cats _on his face_. He sits up, and Bean falls onto his lap and mewls discontentedly. Picking her up, he says, "I'm sorry, Bean. It wasn't my fault. Daddy is an asshole. Isn't that right? Yeees. Yes it is. Daddy is _such_ an asshole." He turns Bean's face towards Levi, who's sitting crosslegged on the bed with Sawney in his lap. In a high, squeaky voice, he says, "_You shouldn't abuse me, Daddy, because I'll grow up to hate myself and run away to join the circus_!"

"You're an idiot," mutters Levi, rolling his eyes.

Eren grins and sets Bean on the mattress with a scratch of her head. "So is it my turn to have a crisis?"

"No. Crises are not allowed until the age of twenty-five at least. Also, stop mocking me." He sets Sawney down on Eren's leg and watches him tumble around for a second. "You're twenty-three."

"I know," Eren says. "It's not a big birthday, don't worry. I know it's been awhile since you turned twenty-three."

"Do you fucking _want_ to live to see twenty-four?" Levi snaps, but there's no real venom behind it. He scratches the cat behind his ears, and he and Eren spend a long moment just staring at each other. He asks, "So you're another year older…feel any different?"

Eren shrugs and falls back, to stare up at the ceiling like they did on Levi's birthday. There's a water stain just barely visible in one of the corners. Levi obviously hasn't noticed yet, or he would be having Words with the landlord as they speak. It doesn't bug Eren per se, because they live in a rainy place and the building is pretty old, and they're leasing this place at a ridiculously cheap price when you consider that they have both the two-bedroom apartment and the space below.

"I don't think I do," Eren mumbles, as he inspects the watermark. He must be turning into Levi, because it's starting to annoy him the longer he stares at it. "I just, you know…I'm very young, at least by most people's standards, and I've already done most of the things that people set out to do, you know? I own—well, co-own—my own business…club…thing. I have a spouse, an apartment, money in the bank. I even have kids when you consider the cats." He scratches the back of Bean's head again. "Which, I mean, I don't really, but you do."

"I told you that you're not allowed to have crisis right now," Levi reminds, with a raised eyebrow and a nudge to Eren's hip. "Besides, this was my entire point on _my_ birthday, but did you listen? No."

"I'm just worried that I'm going to peak in my twenties," Eren sighs, "and then there'll be nothing left for me when I get older. I don't want the next sixty years to be _boring_, Levi."

Levi shrugs, not really knowing what to say. Contemplatively, he pulls his knees to his chest and tucks his feet under Eren's thigh. "Some people do peak in their twenties…but it's not a bad thing. A lot of times, the descent is shorter than the ascent. You'll…well, I don't know. There are still plenty of things to look forward to. Really. Don't get ahead of yourself."

Eren sighs. "I don't want to stagnate, either. I'll get boring."

"Jesus, what are you, a woman? Next thing you'll ask me is _will you still love me if I get fat_?"

"Will you?"

"Shut _up_."

"You," Eren says, and sits up to point at Levi with a raised eyebrow, "were the one going on about acquiring a flatulence problem on your birthday."

Waving a hand, Levi says, "I was turning thirty. I'm owed some dramatic allowance. You're turning _twenty-three_ and, again, crises are not allowed. Come to me when you turn…oh…twenty-eight, we'll call it. Then we'll talk." Seeing that he's done literally nothing to cheer Eren up—and he's not entirely sure when this birthday took such a melancholy turn, but he has the worst suspicion that it's because if him—he sighs and adds, "You have a lot to look forward to. Really, you do. I mean…" he sighs. "I'm not fucking good at this, alright?"

"I know," mumbles Eren, then shrugs and closes his eyes and sighs, "I suppose I'm over it. I just…I don't know."

Levi knows. He knows all too well how crippling fear can sneak up on a person with little to no warning and just absolutely suffocate them. In a show of moral support, he lays down with his head on Eren's shoulder and stares up at the ceiling with him.

"Jesus _fucking _Christ," he growls, and Eren knows that he's seen the watermark, and reacts by pulling the blankets over both of them until they're one tight bundle, because he's suddenly attained the mentality of _if it can't see Levi, Levi can't see it_.

* * *

"So, um, about Passover," Eren breeches the subject on a cold early March morning, while they're sitting at the kitchen table drinking coffee in the blue-hued morning, "I don't think we're going to be able to afford to go to France. Both of us."

"Yes," Levi sighs, because it's something he's been thinking about as well.

"Just because…we got married last year, and we bought this new place, and…"

"I'm aware of the conflicts, Eren," says Levi, perhaps slightly snappish, "but it's not…if we don't go to France, my mother will be alone."

"I can stay here," Eren suggests, "and you can go to France to be with your mother for Passover. I think we can afford for you to go."

"Eren, I'm not spending our first married Passover across the Atlantic Ocean from you. That's a dumb idea and you know it."

"And I'm not gonna let your mother spend Passover alone!" Eren cries, flinging his arms around above his head. "She already thinks so little of me as it is, just because I don't have a fucking uterus and I'll never give her biological grandchildren with your eyes and my hair or whatever the fuck. I'm not giving her more reason to hate me."

"My mother _does not_ hate you."

"Hmm, you're right, maybe she just shows her affection with glares and underhanded insults. Like mother like son, right?"

Levi does not reply so much as react, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms over his chest, legs crossed and glower on in full force. Eren knows he's done wrong, that it was a low blow; Levi's inability to show affection has very little to do with his mother and almost everything to do with his father. It's something they have in common, one of the things they bonded over in the early days. They're both the walking embodiment of daddy issues and they know it. It's one of the many things in their relationship that they actively ignore in the hopes that it will never prove to be relevant.

"That was uncalled for," Eren mumbles, rubbing the back of his neck.

Raising an eyebrow, Levi replies, "It was."

With a sigh, Eren presses his cheek against the kitchen table and closes his eyes. He grumbles, "It would be so much easier if your mother would just get her ass on a plane and come over here for once."

"She hates plane travel."

"So do you, but we go to France every goddamn year—well, I mean, okay, _you _do, I've only been going since I converted, but still. Don't you think it's time she returned the favor? I mean, we were just _in_ France."

There is silence in the kitchen for a few minutes. Levi's chair slides back and Eren thinks he's going to walk out of the kitchen, maybe even out of the apartment. Out on the balcony, probably, to smoke a cigarette even though he supposedly quit four years ago. That thought is derailed, however, when Levi's small, dry hand appears on his shoulder.

"My mother," he sighs, "Is a Frenchwoman. A _Jewish_ Frenchwoman. There are a lot of things that she just can't compute because of that. Things like…having a gay son, and having her son live 3700 miles from her. Firstborns are kind of obligated to stay close and take care of their mothers when they get older. I'm her _only_ child." After a pause of about a minute, he adds, "She doesn't hate you. She's just…wary of you."

"Me? I'm the one she's wary of?"

"Well, the stereotype is that men are more likely to be abusive or manipulative or…_mean_ than women. Basically, she's afraid you're going to treat me like your bitch."

Eren can't help it; he laughs out loud. "Oh my God! That's beautiful. Truly inspiring. As if you'd let _anyone_ treat you like their bitch. As if I'm actually assertive enough to treat you like my bitch…"

"She lives far away. She's only met you a handful of times, you know?"

With a grunt, Eren shrugs and turns his face further into the table. Levi strokes a hand through Eren's hair, starting at his neck and terminating at his temple. Contemplatively, he says, "We've got a month to convince her. It's a bit short of notice, but we'll just have to admit that we didn't realize the conflict until just now."

Eren mutters, "If you want to try, be my guest."

So Levi does.

* * *

"_Bonjour_, Celeste! _Comment allez-vous?_"

Levi smirks to himself at Eren's thick American accent and overeagerness. He and his mother share the same scowl, so Eren should be used to it, but that doesn't stop him from looking more nervous than any man has a right to be when talking to his mother-in-law. Levi knows his mother well enough to realize that she's scowling at the world and not just Eren, but his husband doesn't know that.

Seeing that she's not going to respond to Eren, Levi asks, "_Ça va, Maman_?"

She sighs and shoves her suitcase towards Eren, whom frantically seizes it. Levi takes her lighter bag, swings it over his shoulder. When she's good and ready—his mother is a woman of few words, and those which she does speak are chosen carefully—she grumbles, "_Pas mal_. _Ça va?_"

"_Bien_," Levi says, and after that short exchange, they're off. Eren lags behind with the expression that Levi knows means he's once again bemoaning his life choices—namely, not taking French in high school. Levi has repeatedly told him that he probably wouldn't be able to learn the language anyway, but Eren persists in thinking that he should have had the forethought to try. Like the brat could have known he was going to marry a Frenchman someday.

* * *

"So…you'll come over for Passover, right? The Seder."

"Of course."

Eren smiles to himself in relief. "Thanks, Mom. It means a lot. That you and Dad are so supportive."

For a moment, his mother is silent on the other end of the line. Finally, she says, "We're proud of you, Eren. You know?"

"Um…"

"I know that you don't think we are sometimes, because you went to community college instead of university, or because you're not becoming a doctor like Mikasa, or…well, it doesn't matter. We're proud of you. We couldn't be prouder, honestly. We cried at your wedding."

"Both of you?" Eren mumbles, "Even Dad?"

He's not sure when his step-father stopped being 'Mikasa's dad' and became just 'dad.' Probably right around the time that Eren realized he wasn't going to b receiving any kind of less-preferential treatment from him simply because Eren wasn't his flesh and blood. It hasn't stopped him from having some kind of crippling fear that he'll disappoint the man that gave Eren so many opportunities just by coming into his life at the right point.

"Him more than me…maybe." His mother chuckles to herself. It's a low, comforting sound. "He loves you like his own. Always has. When we married, he couldn't wait to adopt you. Couldn't wait to call you his son."

Something in Eren untangles after all these years. He never knew that.

"I, um…thank you, Mom."

"Anytime, sweetheart."

* * *

Levi has a few cousins in America, and an aunt, and a lot of distant family that Eren really isn't well-acquainted with. He gets the vague impression that Levi isn't, either, but his mother is, and despite the fact that Eren finds it strange that she knows all of these people in America while she still lives in France, he goes along with it.

"I have no idea who any of these people are," Eren whispers to Levi in the kitchen, where they've escaped the mayhem for the moment. "I was only just starting to recognize the faces in France. Now there are all new ones. Help."

"I don't know many of them either," mutters Levi, "but, chances are, if you address them as _cousin_, they'll respond to it. Also, like three of them are also named Levi. Not sure which ones though."

"You're technically named Rivaille."

"Tch. You don't think I know that? And for future reference, they are too. It's a family name. Don't look at me like that, I know it's a strange name. It's complicated…and mostly stems from the fact I come from a long line of bad spellers."

"Rivaille, though. It doesn't even…_sound_ like Levi. I mean it does, but, I mean…you know what I mean."

"I know." Levi looks at Eren, that familiar look that says something along the lines of _you've just insulted my intelligence_, which is a very familiar look when it comes to Levi. "Just don't worry about it, alright? You only have to deal with them for a day and then it's back to the previously-scheduled programming of familiar faces in France…hopefully for the rest of eternity. There's a reason I don't keep in contact with my extended family."

"They're all definitely your family, though."

"How's that?"

"They're all short." He's literally the tallest person in the room at any given time.

Levi flicks his ear and mutters, "Why do I even deal with you…" before walking out of the kitchen.

Eren takes quite a liking to a cousin (second cousin? Cousin once removed? He honestly doesn't know) of Levi's named Rachel. She's short and blonde with a blue ribbon in her hair, likes to sing nonsense tunes, and is just barely two years old. Rachel's mother leaves her with Eren, perhaps somewhat unwisely, thinking that she probably can't come to harm with an adult watching her, especially when that adult owns the apartment they're all in.

Rachel is just learning how to walk and clings to Eren happily as he goes about his business. She coos a lot, because she doesn't really know sentences yet. She can say things like, _where's mama_ and _hello!_, but other than that she's at a loss.

"You have something on your foot," Levi tells him halfway through the evening.

"This is…"

"Rachel, I know." Levi reaches down and picks her up. "She's my cousin's daughter. I told you when she was born. You even picked out the card I sent her mother, because I'm inept at those things. According to you." He pokes Rachel's belly, producing a giggle. "She's gotten big."

"Was it really two years ago now?" Eren remarks, and stares at Rachel for a few seconds. "She's such a cutie. I love kids."

"I like them when you can give them back," Levi mutters, but Eren hears a certain tone of _something_ underneath his breath. Then he adds, "We're not having that conversation yet, Eren. A year, remember? We said we'd talk about it in a year."

"I know," Eren murmurs, and watches Rachel pillow her head on Levi's shoulder and can't help but think he looks amazingly good with a baby in his arms. "I was just…mentioning."

Nodding, Levi mumbles, "I think about it too…sometimes," and carries Rachel off to be with her mother.

* * *

"I'm never, never, never _ever_ doing Passover with your family again," Eren groans, when they're finally alone with a mountain of dishes, and Levi's mother snoring in the guest room. "I mean, really. Honestly. That was more stressful than family Christmases, and family Christmases were _never_ fun."

Levi curls up behind him on the sofa and murmurs, "You're right. Next Passover it can be just you and me and a lot of kosher wine. We could even be really naughty and have leavened bread."

"I love it when you talk dirty," Eren murmurs, then chants, "Who likes _chametz_? We like _chametz_! Who likes _chametz_? We dooo…" under his breath, because he might be just a bit tipsy and just a big overtired, and when Levi's pressing against his back like that, warm and comforting, he's relaxed enough that anything is liable to come out of his mouth.

"Blasphemy."

"No, self-preservation. Honest to God, babe, all of that cleaning almost killed me."

"Do you know how much hell I would have gone through if my mother found even _one single_ breadcrumb on our counter?"

"You liked the cleaning, admit it."

He feels Levi's mouth twitch against his neck. "Maybe. Just a bit."

"You have a _fetish_."

"So?"

"Can't help but notice that's not denial."

Levi flicks his ear, and then buries his nose in the nape of Eren's neck and dozes for several minutes. Eventually, he sighs, "We need to do dishes."

"Leave it until morning?"

"No."

Eren groans. "I hate being Jewish."

"Welcome to being Jewish; attaining a healthy level of self-hatred is the final step of initiation," Levi says, then kicks Eren in the thigh to get him to move. "Come on, the sooner we get them done the sooner we can sleep."

* * *

They wake up the next morning fully clothed, above the covers, and laying severely askew. All of this with no added bonus of a wild night before hits Eren in the face with the realization that he's an adult. He takes it well, simply undressing and sliding under the covers for four more hours of sleep because it's a holiday and he's not supposed to do any work, goddamn it.

* * *

"Celeste…can I ask you a question?"

She looks up over the rim of her reading glasses. She's a handsome woman and it's so painfully obvious where Levi got his looks from that Eren can't help but look at her and see, in some way, the Levi he'll be looking at thirty years from now. She's got a rounder face, and her eyes are less rimmed, but they share the sleek black hair and the facial features. It's probably one of the reasons Eren is so ridiculously intimidated by her.

"Um…so, uh, what does…_mon cœur_ mean?"

She furrows her brows, looks down, and says, "Ah…I am not sure of the word in English. It would be…um…_cœur_ is heart, literally. My heart. But the phrase is…different." She tilts her head to the side and adds, "Why do you ask?"

Eren shrugs. "Just curious."

"Ah." She doesn't look convinced, but lets it drop.

* * *

While she's staying, Celeste is constantly asking Levi to translate words that she doesn't know how to say in English, or else can't be bothered to take the effort to recall. The entire week is filled with sentences such as, "The recipe needs…ah…_aubergine_, Revaille?" and Levi responding, "Eggplant, _maman_," and it's something that Eren becomes accustom to after only a few days.

However, English is still Levi's second language, and sometimes even he gets caught up. It's not that he never learned the word—it's that he just doesn't use it often in normal conversation, or else he just legitimately cannot call the word to mind. In other words, Levi has brianfarts the same as everyone else—only his speak French.

Eren has a suspicion that he would find Celeste's mealtime stories funnier if it weren't for the language barrier. He can't tell if Levi is chuckling because it's genuinely funny to him, or because it's his mother. All Eren can get out of this one is that it has to do with a hunting trip that she went on with her father many years ago, and that her uncle was a really inept shot.

"So, there we are…and my father decides we should perhaps try smaller, you know? So, he tells me, 'Celeste, _mon cher_, you must watch your uncle, or there will be no…'" and then she pauses, and looks at Levi, and says, "_lapin_, Revaille?"

Levi opens his mouth to reply, closes it, and furrows his brows. "That would be…I know what it is, it's just…I can't think of…" he glances at Eren, as if to ask for help, but Eren has no clue. "Oh, Christ, it's literally one of the first words you learn in English, I mean what the fuck…"

"If you are not remembering, it is fine," Celeste assures.

Levi waves a hand impatiently. "No, now it's going to bug me for the rest of the day. What's the word? It's on the tip of my tongue."

"Lahpahn?" Eren tries. "Does it sound like the English word?"

"No. It's an animal," Levi says, getting more frustrated by the second, "Small and fluffy, with the ears, long and floppy, and the tail, you make stew out of it." When Levi gets frustrated, his French accent can bleed through, and it just makes the situation all that more comical to Eren.

"…rabbit? Bunny-rabbit?"

"Yes! Rabbit!"

It takes Eren about three minutes to stop laughing, with Levi abusing him both verbally and physically the entire time. "I can't believe you forgot how to say _rabbit_!"

"Shut up, asshole!" Levi snaps. "Next time you forget a word, I'm going to laugh at you!"

"No, it's just…" Eren giggles, beginning to calm down, and rubs a tear out of his eye. "You're so…good at English that I forget sometimes. That it's your second language. It's startling when I remember." He really, honestly enjoys it when he's reminded of Levi's heritage, and all of the unique things that make him _Levi_. Sometimes, though, they punch him in the face, and it takes a few minutes to recover from the blow.

Levi pokes at his food aggressively as Eren catches his breath. While it's quiet, Celeste looks between them and says, "So, Mr. I-Speak-English-So-Well…"

"Better than you!" Levi says, and receives a slap across his hands, and Eren dissolves into more laughter.

* * *

"Did you have a good time this holiday, _Maman_?"

"Yes," Celeste says, contemplatively. She sits between them at the gate where she's to pick up her plane. Levi knows she dislikes plane flight, but she's significantly less sour than she was upon arriving, so part of him holds out hope that this trip was good for her, in some way. "It has changed much since I was here. For the better, I think."

"What has?" Eren asks.

"America," she says simply. Pats his knee and adds, "It was good to spend time with my new son-in-law."

Because he isn't quite sure what to say to that, Eren stays quiet. They call for boarding soon after, anyway, and they watch her get on the plane after wishing her a safe trip.

As they head back towards the car, walking arm-in-arm as they sometimes do, Eren muses, "I suppose you were right."

"About what?"

"She doesn't hate me."

"I told you."

* * *

Eren's phone rings sometime after two in the morning. Levi wakes up but stays still, waiting with quiet breath as Eren answers. It's a wrong number, he expects, or a telemarketer phoning from Alaska or some equally stupid place where the timezone is different enough to give logic to the act of calling at such an unholy hour.

Then Eren sounds more awake, and he's muttering, "I'll be there in a few minutes. Trost?" and that's the name of a nearby hospital. Levi catches it, but holds onto hope that he's misinterpreted until Eren's there, shaking his shoulder and whispering, "Levi. Levi, baby, wake up."

"I'm awake," Levi mumbles, sitting up and digging the heel of his hand into his itchy eye. "Who's in the hospital?"

"Marco," Eren murmurs, over his shoulder as he slides out of bed. "Um, it was Mikasa on the phone. They're not…sure what happened. He, um, he was brought in around midnight, but they only now figured out who to call. Apparently, um, they called his sister first, and she called Jean, and it took awhile because she's all the way in Phoenix and she apparently lost Jean's number at some point. He's at the hospital now, I guess, and Mikasa's with him, and they're calling people. Um…I don't…they said he's pretty bad, and…"

"I'll drive," Levi says, because it's probably the safest option right now. He slides out of bed as well, pulls a pair of pants—those he wore last night, and normally it would disgust him, but right now he doesn't have time to look in the closet—on over his sleep shorts, attempts to pat down his hair, and throws on a sweater because it's still April and the mornings are chilly.

"If you…I mean…you don't have to…"

"Hush," murmurs Levi, hoping that Eren's nonsensical babbling is not an attempt to ask him to stay behind. "I'm coming. Unless you don't want me to." Irritably, he adds, "Where the fuck are my keys?" mostly to himself, and pats his pockets for what must be the eighth time.

"Probably in the living room," Eren says, voice far too small. The silent _please come_ is apparent and obvious.

Levi finds his keys, and they go.

* * *

They find Jean and Mikasa sitting in the accident and emergency waiting room. On Saturday morning, pre-dawn, the place is packed, and Levi feels extremely uncomfortable in the presence of the many sick buckets and oozing wounds possessed by the patrons of the ER. Typically, he would excuse himself. But Eren looks just a little bit dead behind the eyes and he can't leave him alone in that condition, even with his sister and a guy he's known since high school.

"What do you know?" Eren murmurs as he sits, as though to be unobtrusive even though there are no less than four screaming children in the room, and copious coughing and sneezing.

"Nothing," Jean mutters resentfully. "Absolutely nothing. They won't tell me fuck-all because I'm not family. I don't know jack shit right now."

"Mikasa?" Eren mumbles, "what can be done?"

Mikasa sighs, looks a little bit lost and a little bit hopeless. "Not a lot. Unless Marco suddenly regains consciousness, or he's taken out of intensive care, our options are thin. At this point, pretty much the only question the doctors can answer is _is he alive or dead_."

Eren sighs and closes his eyes. "Shit."

Levi says, "Have you tried calling his sister?"

"We haven't been able to get a hold of her since she first called," Jean sighs. "I don't know…she's always been a bit…flaky. That's not to say that I think she doesn't care, I just think she'd rather ignore that the situation is happening than worry about it and be powerless to do anything."

"Wow," Levi mutters. "Don't we all wish we could?" He can name about six times just off the top of his mind that he wishes he could have flipped his 'caring' switch and not given a fuck.

For a minute, Jean stares at him in a way that Levi has come to associate with snarky back-sass. He's half-expecting the younger man to come out with a snarl of _what are you doing here_ or something similar, but all Jean ends up doing is releasing a slightly hysterical bit of laughter and a, "Yeah…" before crossing his arms and looking away. He looks small and uncomfortable and young. All three of them do, actually; Mikasa and Eren aren't much different at the moment, when it comes to physicality.

"Who else have you called?" Eren asks, still in that quiet, hushed voice. Like if he talks quietly enough, all of it won't seem so real.

"Everyone who would care," Mikasa sighs, then winces and adds, "Well, anyone who needs to know, I suppose I should say. Armin's on his way, but you know as well as I do how hard it is to get into the city at three AM on a Saturday. He might not be here for an hour or more. Sasha and Connie know, and Christa. Ymir didn't pick up her phone, but I think she might be with Christa. I…don't know whether they're coming or not. I mean, I don't know. Maybe."

Levi has never heard Mikasa sound so confused and timid. He doesn't like it.

"What are we supposed to do?" Eren mumbles.

Jean sighs, and the action seems to make him crumble in on himself. He presses his hands to his eyes and his elbows to his knees. "Wait, I suppose. Hope. Pray."

So, quietly, Levi sings and holds Eren's hand.

* * *

At four o'clock, Armin comes in and silently sits next to Eren. He looks like he's been recently hit by a bus or possibly a train; dark circles under his eyes and usually sleek hair in disarray. He didn't even bother to throw on an actual pair of pants. He's sitting there in a pair of pajama pants with Mickey Mouse on them, but Levi doesn't judge. Can't, really.

Dawn comes with the arrival of Sasha and Connie and some food that nobody really touches because it's the only way they know how to comfort. Eren holds the same half of a bagel in his hand for an entire hour before Levi takes it from him, wraps it up and throws it away. Jean doesn't even look at the food. He's been staring at the floor for the better part of two hours now. Levi would think he's fallen asleep, were it not for the fact that he can see the whites of his eyes, sometimes, when he moves.

At seven o'clock AM on the dot, Levi pulls out his phone and ventures across the waiting room to make a phone call. They all stare at him, and it's reminiscent of a horde of meerkats. It would be funny if the stakes in this situation were not so high.

On the third ring, Erwin answers. "Levi. I almost rejected your call. I thought you were my alarm. Why are you calling so early?"

"My husband's friend is in the hospital," Levi says, without preamble. "His sister is in Arizona and it doesn't look like she's working on getting her ass over here. I need to know what our options are."

"Levi, that's really not my area of expertise…I'm an environmental lawyer…"

"I'm not asking for a fucking _favor_, Erwin. I'm making a demand. I need to know what can be done, and I need to fucking know now, because as it stands there's a kid somewhere in this hospital who's probably scared out of his fucking mind and could probably use a friend right now."

Erwin sighs and says, "I'll see what I can do."

"It needs to happen in about half no time, Erwin. I'm serious."

He's placed on hold for about twenty minutes. He stays near the window, because the ER is partially underground and he can't get a signal for shit with an entire hospital over his head. The group surrounding Jean loses interest in him after about ten minutes, and when Erwin finally comes back on the line, everyone has seemingly reverted back to staring at their feet or hands and attempting to pretend they're anywhere but here.

"Okay," Erwin says, and he sounds even more out of it than he did when he first answered. Too much work so early in the morning, obviously. "There's a social worker who operates out of the hospital. Her name is Mina Carolina. She's going to do you a huge favor and give you some information on the kid, even though she really shouldn't. I'm going to give you her number. You should probably give it to someone who cares more than you, because she's only going to say it once."

Levi sighs irritably, takes down the number and hangs up on Erwin. After a moment of debate, he chooses Jean.

"Here," he says, handing the slip of paper to the younger man. "This social worker can tell you more."

Jean stares at him for a moment, as if trying to figure out if it's a trick. Eventually, he takes it, and calls the number, and convinces the social worker, Mina, to go on speaker phone.

"Okay, Miss Carolina," Jean says to the phone now on a side table he's moved between the two rows of seats they are occupying. "Go ahead. We can hear you."

"Okay," comes from the phone. She has one of those overly kind voices that Levi has always really resented in a person, mostly because he can't help but think they're incredibly fake. He ignores his ire, for the moment, simply because now is not the time for it. "Um, Marco Bodt was brought in at…12:08 AM, this morning by an ambulance called for by emergency services. He was found…in a flipped car off the interstate. He was unconscious upon arrival and appeared to have sustained grievous injury to his…_right_ side. He went into surgery at 12:18 and came out at four o'clock. He's in intensive care and is…unresponsive so far. He's been stabilized." The occasional pause and faint rustling of paper would indicate that she's reading directly off of incident reports. "So far, the records reflect that no family was present. I've been informed that that's not necessarily true?"

"His sister is in Arizona," Jean says, "I'm the closest thing to family he's got right now. He really needs me."

"I'll see what I can do, Mr. Kirstein," sighs the social worker. "Hospital policy says that a patient is not allowed non-family visitors in intensive care or hospice, except in extraordinary cases."

"I think this is a pretty extraordinary case," Eren snaps. Levi hushes him.

"I would agree," Mina Carolina says, "but I'm not sure the hospital administration will see it the same way, sir. All I can offer is my sincere promise that I will _try_."

"Okay," Jean sighs. "Thank you."

* * *

It's approaching ten in the morning before any progress is made. At 9:40, after Christa and Ymir have finally arrived and after Eren has fallen asleep on Levi's shoulder, after Jean has gone through one period of fitful dozing and they've each gone through about three cups of hospital waiting room coffee, there is finally improvement in the situation.

A shorter woman with long brown pair pulled to either side of her shoulders comes out the wrong way through the ER doors—or, at least, it seems like the wrong way because in the past seven hours they've only seen people go _through _it, not come out it—and speaks to a nurse, who points at their small congregation. The woman advances towards them and stops right before her shins hit Jean's knees.

"Jean Kirstein, right?" she asks. Levi thinks he recognizes the voice. It all makes sense when she continues, "I'm Mina Carolina. We talked on the phone a few hours ago? I'm, uh, sorry I couldn't speak to you sooner, but we weren't exactly sure of the situation until just now."

"What would the situation be?" Jean mumbles, croaky from not speaking for three hours.

"Mister Bodt has regained consciousness," she says, and all at once everyone sits up, straight and at attention. "He hasn't been taken out of intensive care, but the decision was made that the hospital policy could be suspended given the circumstances. Unfortunately, given the size and relative lack of privacy in the wards, we can only allow one of you down. I'm sorry, I didn't realize there was a group of you." She glances timidly around at them.

"Go, Jean," Mikasa says, and everyone else makes vaguely assenting noises. "Yours is probably the face he needs to see most right now."

So Jean goes.

* * *

"Can I ask you something?"

They aren't in the ER anymore, mostly because someone did them the courtesy of informing them that there is a family waiting lounge they can use. There are several vending machines, a long line of armchairs and couches, and a hot drinks machine. Levi ambushes Mikasa as she's getting a coffee, and when she looks at him, the glare is less angry and more resigned.

"Okay."

"Do you think that your boyfriend would look that wrecked if it was _you_ in the hospital?"

Mikasa does her best to scowl, but it's really not her best work, and as she does it she looks down into her coffee. Mikasa isn't shy, and the fact that she's avoiding his eyes is enough to tell him that she thinks she has something to hide. He knows that, when she knows she's right, she's not afraid to stand up to even the most important of her superiors. Levi is certainly not her superior.

"He would care."

"I realize that. But do you think he would be worried so sick? I'm not saying he would blow it off if you were in the hospital. I'm just…" Levi sighs and closes his eyes, trying to gather his thoughts. "I know what it's like to fear life without a certain person in it." It's hard for him to admit this, and even harder when Mikasa looks up and meets his eyes and he knows she knows. It's pretty obvious, to be honest, but there was still part of him that was hoping to retain some modicum of anonymity. Nevertheless, he forges on, "I don't see that in Jean when he looks at you."

Shrugging, Mikasa says, "It was never…a do or die thing for me. He and I have fun. That's…that's all."

It becomes a bit easier for him to speak after she says that, because she's not lying. She really doesn't have any overdeveloped feelings for Jean, which shouldn't cloud her judgment.

"I have seen it in him tonight, though. When he thought he was losing Marco."

Mikasa nods. "I know. He's in love with Marco."

Levi's eyebrows raise to fraternize with his hair line. "You do?"

"I've known for a long time. He has a hard time being honest with himself, though, and I don't mind being cared for and having someone to go out with. I told Eren it wouldn't last. I wasn't lying."

"I think you need to talk to him," Levi mutters.

Mikasa shrugs. Then she glances at him and says, cryptically, "I suppose you and I have more in common than one might think."

Levi nods, because somehow he understands what she's implying. "I think we do, too."

* * *

At four o'clock in the afternoon, they get home. Levi drops his keys on the kitchen table and leans, stomach-first, against the sink. Eren drops his jacket onto one of the table chairs and stands there, silently, somewhere in the middle of the room.

"I suppose stuff like this really makes you examine your own mortality," Eren murmurs.

Levi turns his face into his shoulder, glancing at Eren out of his periphery. "I love you."

Eren takes the necessary steps across the kitchen, kisses his cheek, his neck, his shoulder.

* * *

Sometimes, Eren will have a nightmare. One specific, reoccurring nightmare that he's been having since before he could remember. It begins with him standing somewhere high up, almost like the edge of a building but, for some reason, he subconsciously knows he's standing on the top of a huge wall. He stands at the edge, looks over, and jumps off. Bites his hand and his body explodes in pain and then he's something large, something terrible, and he watches as the him-that-is-not-him does terrible, horrible things.

When he wakes up, he's in a cold sweat, usually screaming, usually on the verge of falling out of bed. It took him months to trust himself to fall asleep next to Levi knowing that there was always the possibility of a nightmare, of embarrassing himself with his screaming and flailing.

Amazingly enough, Levi has never made him feel shitty for the nightmares.

The entire week after Marco's brush with near-death, Eren has the nightmare. A horrible twist starts showing up where he sees Marco with an enormous part of his body missing, his entire right side, and eventually he realizes with complete and utter horror that he's had a _bite _taken out of him. Eren wakes up from this particular dream and cries and cries, and hunches over and presses his hands to the back of his neck unconsciously, for reasons entirely unknown to even himself.

"He was bitten," Eren whispers to himself, and Levi sits up and presses a hand to his back. "They were…eaten."

"It was just a dream," Levi says.

"I know," Eren whispers. But sometimes it's so vivid that it's entirely too hard to forget. Sometimes he wakes up and he swears that he lives in a world where the monsters he sees in his dreams are real. "I just…it's so…real. I feel…I could see him, he was…it was…oh god."

"Shh."

"I can taste the blood, I can…I…oh my god, I'm bleeding. Levi, I'm bleeding." He's actually bitten his hand in his sleep, has actually sunk his teeth in and broken skin. He stares with muted horror at his hand as Levi gets out of bed and goes in search of something to clean him up with.

"Am I a freak?" Eren asks, as Levi cleans and disinfects his hand.

"No," Levi says, perhaps a bit more ferociously than is warranted. "We all have nightmares."

"We don't all bite through our hands in our sleep."

Holding Eren's hand in his lap, Levi carefully presses butterfly closures to his palm. He stares at his work with undue concentration, and Eren only realizes that he's actually ruminating on something mentally when he starts, "Sometimes, I wake up in the middle of the night, and…I'm absolutely sure that I've lost you. I don't know why, and I don't know where the feeling comes from, but it happens sometimes. I wake up and I look at the darkness, and for a minute, I can't…can't feel you behind me, and I get the worst feeling that you're gone and…and it's like…like I've woken up from dreaming of you only to remember that you've died…and I'm alone." He presses one final closure to Eren's palm. "It terrifies me."

"Sometimes I see you dead," Eren whispers, "and you're laying in a field of grass and it's as if I'm looking down at you from high up and…"

"Let's not," Levi says, and tosses the wrappings from the closures into Eren's bedside wastepaper basket. "Let's not talk about it."

"Okay," Eren says, but neither of them gets anymore sleep that night.

* * *

"Hey, let's get out of here."

Raising an eyebrow, Levi asks, "What do you have in mind?" He's curled up on the couch, wearing a sweater that used to belong to Eren, a maroon cable-knit that he thinks he got for a Christmas present when he was sixteen. He's also wearing the reading glasses that he resents having to use, and a pair of pants that's long enough to slip over his socked heels.

Eren shrugs. "I was thinking…driving until we don't want to drive any further. I like that idea. Take a blanket with you…and some pillows. We might not end up coming back tonight."

Levi considers the proposal. Nods and mumbles, "Alright," because the past few weeks have been rough and he's feeling an itching, uncomfortable need for a change of scenery as well. So he gets up and closes up his book and disappears into the bedroom. He grabs bedding, enough to make the back seat of their CUV comfortable if they turn down the seats. When he comes back into the kitchen, Eren is holding a bag—four water bottles, two granola bars, some jerky, a flashlight, condoms.

"Will the cats be okay?" Eren ponders, watching Sawney and Bean wrestling their way down the hallway.

"They're cats," Levi says. "They probably won't even realize we're gone as long as we leave them with full bowls of food and water."

Eren nods and refills the bowls, and Levi goes out to the car and starts it up. When Eren gets in the car, he puts it in drive and just goes. They don't speak for almost an hour. Eren braces his feet against the glove box and it annoys Levi, but he doesn't say anything because he thinks Eren has been through enough shit lately.

"Do you remember," Eren mumbles, after about an hour of aimless driving down the interstate in the direction of the setting sun, "When you took me to see the ocean? Do you remember that beach? It was too cold to swim, but it was…pretty. I'd lived within two hundred miles of the ocean my entire life, but I'd never seen it before."

"That was in Greenwich," Levi says.

Eren hums in recognition.

An hour later, just by chance, they end up in Connecticut. The parking lot to the beach overlooks it, and they get out and sit on the hood and stare out at the ocean. There's a vast emptiness on one side, where the coast of Manhattan ends and the Atlantic Ocean begins. Eren stares out at this portion of the seascape until the sun goes down too far to see.

* * *

In May, Mikasa graduates. Their entire family comes and takes up an entire row on the floor in the basketball stadium of Mikasa's university. Eren's on the end, with his mother and father on one side of him, and Levi next to him, and his aunt and uncle on the other side of Levi. Mikasa's aunt—her father's sister—is on the other side of them, and so on and so forth. Mikasa's maternal grandparents sit somewhere in the middle of the row. Eren has never had much to do with them, because they live in Japan and there was really no point in sending him over every other summer like they did Mikasa. He recognizes them just enough to know who they are.

For a moment, just a split-second, it occurs to him to be jealous. That Mikasa is attaining something that was never an option for him. That their entire family is looking at her with pride and fondness in their eyes and that will probably never be him, standing up onstage and shaking someone's hand while they hand him a piece of paper that basically means he's worth something in society's eyes.

That train is forcefully derailed before it gains too much speed. It's a dumb thought and every part of him knows it. He long ago admitted the fact that he might be a less than spectacular example of a human being, that he would never be exceptional. He'll just be average, but there are people that love him for his averageness, and he honestly can't bring himself to begrudge Mikasa her remarkableness.

He takes a picture with Mikasa in her all-black graduation robes and he in his all-black suit. It's an odd reflection of the one taken four years ago, when she graduated high school and he'd already been out of school for a year and their mother had them squeeze together on their front lawn and take a very similar picture.

"I'm proud of you," he says after, when their family has all gotten their hands on her and congratulated her.

"Can I tell you something?" Mikasa mumbles, playing with his pocket square.

"Anything," Eren says.

She looks up at him, with brown eyes that haven't really changed all that much since they were small children together, and says, "I got into Johns Hopkins."

Eren says, "What?" maybe a bit too loudly, because several people around them look up, and Mikasa quickly slaps a hand over his mouth.

"Would you be quieter?" she hisses. "I don't want the entire world to know right now. You're the first one I've told. I only found out yesterday."

"Holy shit," Eren breathes, "That's…that's amazing! Why aren't you telling everyone? Oh my God, why aren't you jumping up and down? There are people in your field who would fucking _kill each other_ for that, Mikasa! How did you keep it to yourself? If it had been me, I would have been calling everyone I knew…"

Sighing, Mikasa shrugs and looks down. "I don't know…it's just…far away."

Eren shrugs. "I know, but…it's…so awesome. God, Mikasa, I'm so proud of you. That's amazing. Holy shit." Then he realizes that Mikasa isn't smiling, or even reacting to the praise he's heaping on her, and he gets the strangest feeling that Mikasa isn't really very happy about this. Tilting his head to the side, he says, "Mikasa…you're happy, right?"

"I'd be stupid not to be," Mikasa says, like it's a duty. "It's Johns Hopkins."

"That doesn't really answer my question."

She looks away and down, like she doesn't want to look at his face or doesn't want him to see hers. "Will you miss me, Eren?"

"Of course," he mumbles, "But…you need to do things for yourself, and not for me. You're not meant to stay in one place your entire life. I am, maybe. At least it seems that way. But you've always been headed towards greater things, you know? Even when we were kids, people knew that you were going to go places."

"It must be nice," Mikasa mumbles, "to not have the expectations of the world on your shoulders."

"Sometimes it is. But sometimes it hurts that people can't be disappointed simply because they're already disappointed."

Mikasa's expression jerks, but Eren can't tell quite in what way because she's still turned away from him. From underneath her fringe she says, "I was never disappointed in you, Eren."

"And I've always been proud of you," Eren replies, "but I'm sorry, if you don't take this opportunity, you're dumb."

She chuckles a bit, lowly, and finally looks up. They stare at each other for a few moments, and then finally she says, "I know. And I will. I just…need to get used to the idea. It's a lot to take in, and…I'm not sure how you did it, you know? Starting your life so young. I'm twenty-two and I don't like the idea of being on my own. Not so much away from Mom and Dad, but away from you. It scares me. I'm not sure how you handled it at just eighteen. You must be a stronger person than me."

"I'm really not. We're just…strong in different ways." Eren smiles in a way that he hopes is comforting and glances around, over Mikasa's head in search of a familiar sandy brown head of hair. When he doesn't find it, confirming his earlier belief that its owner was not present for the ceremony, he asks, "Where's Jean? I would have though that he'd come to your graduation."

Shrugging, Mikasa says, "He's still looking after Marco. I told him that it was okay for him not to come if Marco was having a bad day. I guess he must be."

Eren nods solemnly, because they're all so glad that Marco is out of the hospital but still all incredibly upset at the news that the young man may never have the use of his right arm again. He glances at the nondescript grey concrete of the bare bones sports stadium and carefully inquires, "Do you think Jean will follow you to Baltimore?"

"No," Mikasa says simply, and that's the end of that.

Eren sometimes feels okay with being a simpleton. At least his life doesn't seem as complicated.

* * *

Two weeks later, Jean and Mikasa break up. The event passes without much remark, although Eren can't deny that his step becomes a bit springier afterwards.

* * *

"Eren, that stance is shit."

Eren sighs and grumbles under his breath, widening his feet and looking up at Levi, with just a slight glare in his eyes. "Better?"

Tilting his head to the side, Levi nods. "Yeah. It's okay."

"Levi, stop getting on him," Petra says from the other side of him. "I mean, Jesus. I've never seen someone get on their husband like you do." Playfully, to Eren—but also to Levi, because she doesn't say it quietly enough to prevent him from hearing—she asks, "I don't get how you stay in the club. How long has it been now? Six years?"

"Seven," they both say automatically. Levi adds, "Seven years in July," and they stare at each other, and smirk to themselves. Then Levi says, "He's going to go for his next rank soon, and then it will be more than me breathing down his neck. There are worse things than having your husband tell you your stance is shit. Like, I don't know, having a Grand Master tell you your stance is shit."

Petra shrugs and steps away.

Levi looks back at Eren, nudges his forward foot to the left with his own foot, and nods to himself. "Better. You're fine, I suppose. We're done for the day, anyway." Louder, he tells the room at large, "We're done for the day."

There's a vague rumble of relief throughout the room. In stark contrast to the children's classes, it only takes the advanced class about ten minutes to vacate the premises, because most of them don't have to wait for rides and there are far less of them. The last one out is Hanji, and Levi stands at the door talking to her for a moment while Eren goes around and shuts the curtains, folds the mats, fiddles with Levi's phone because he has it plugged into a set of speakers to play music during class, and the current song annoys him.

He comes to a song that makes him smirk to himself as Levi approaches. Looking up, he asks, "Recognize this song?"

Levi snorts. "I'm a few years from going senile, you know. I doubt I'll forget the significance of that song for at least another ten years."

Nevertheless, Eren presses his face as close to Levi's as possible without touching him, grins and says, "It's the song we danced to at our wedding."

"I know."

"Wanna dance?"

"Ugh," Levi scoffs, and turns around. "I've danced once in the last year, that's more than enough for me. Eren, do _not_," he adds, when he feels Eren's hands on his waist, and the gentle sway of his hips when he drags him bodily closer. "I'll hurt you."

"Mmm, no you won't," Eren murmurs into his neck, and kisses it, and Levi might melt just a bit. Of course, just a bit of melting when it comes to Levi is like the difference between -200 degrees and -190, but it's the principal of the thing. "Come on, baby. Dance with me. Or we can just do this, I suppose. I like this." He hums along with the song and presses his hands against Levi's stomach, and Levi allows himself to close his eyes and lean back almost imperceptibly and relax slightly. Eren closes his eyes and sways.

"You know," he says, after a few moments, "I'm really glad my mom signed me up for that self defense class that one time."

"Yeah," Levi agrees. "I am too, sometimes." He smirks to himself when Eren scoffs, and just barely traces Eren's hands with his own.

* * *

One night in June, Levi walks into the living room to see Eren staring at this laptop like it's a ghost.

"What?" he asks, slightly alarmed. "Why are you making that face?"

"There's an email sitting in my inbox," Eren says slowly, "From someone named Grisha Jaeger."

"A cousin?" Levi muses, leaning over the back of the couch to get a better view of the aforementioned email. "Are you freaking out just because you have the same last name as them? It's pretty common in Germany, isn't it?"

"Grisha Jaeger was my father's…my biological father's name." Over the years, Eren has come to refer to his father in the past tense. It's an unhealthy habit that remains from being young and confused and finding it easier to accept the idea that his father just didn't exist anymore, rather than that he had voluntarily left. "The name Grisha is a whole lot less common. And I've never told anyone my father's name, so the odds of this being some kind of sick joke are slim to none."

Levi remains silent for several minutes, unspeaking, mostly because he's not sure how to react, but also because it's clear that Eren needs some thinking room right now. He goes into the kitchen and pours what's left in the teakettle into a cup, drops a bag in and brings it to Eren.

Eventually his curiosity gets the better of him, and he asks, "Are you going to open it?"

Eren continues to stare at the screen until, slowly, he moves his shoulders in a motion that's not exactly a shrug, because it's not nearly so flippant, but is reminiscent of one. "I don't know. On one hand, this could answer some of my questions. On the other, it may just create more for me."

"Just take a minute," Levi mumbles. "Think it over. I'm going to…I'm going to leave you alone, okay?"

Eren nods slowly, and Levi gets up, finds himself in the bedroom, and ultimately falls asleep.

Three hours later, Eren wakes him up by crawling into bed. It's now the early hours of the next day, and Levi is almost ready to roll back over and sleep again when he remembers the events of earlier. Quietly, in that scratchy tone of voice that comes from not waking up fully before speaking, he asks, "Did you open the email?"

"Yeah."

"What did it say?"

Eren heaves a large sigh, which Levi would think theatrical if his entire chest didn't seem to cave in on itself when he does so. Instead, all it does is tell him something bad is coming.

"Apparently," Eren mumbles, "Grisha Jaeger is actually the name of…my father's…son. By another woman, not my mother. My, uh, half brother, I suppose? He told me that…my dad…my biological father died. Last month. Really suddenly, apparently, of some sort of…aneurysm. And he told me that he found out about me because my biological father's will mentioned me. It said something about…giving me some key to some box that's supposedly still in the attic of my mother's house. The email was to tell me that the key was coming in the mail. The guy, this…Grisha Jaeger Jr., he didn't even know we were half-brothers. He just thought I was some guy that his dad knew. I'm…I don't…" Eren goes very quiet all at once. Levi presses a hand to his face, and it comes away wet.

"That's fucked up," Levi says, because it's the only thing he can offer. "I mean, really."

Again, Eren sighs. "Um, so…I kind of…looked this guy up. Grisha Jaeger Jr. is a year older than me."

It takes Levi a moment to process what this means. When he does, he shakes his head and snorts in disbelief. "You're kidding me. You're actually telling me that your father lived some kind of double life? Jesus Christ, could that be any more soap opera?"

"I really don't need the condescending bullshit right now," Eren snaps. It's a flashback to the angry, hormonal teenager Levi met seven years ago. So many of Eren's anger management problems have sorted themselves out over time, but sometimes he can still fly off the handle at the slightest provocation. When he's in a delicate state like this in the first place, it's even easier.

It takes all of Levi's willpower to keep from snapping back. Instead, he says, "That came out wrong."

Eren lets out all of his breath at once and falls back against his pillow, balls the entire comforter into one mass and curls his body around it. Once he's taking up a satisfactory amount of space, he says, "Whatever. I just don't know what to do."

"Email this guy back," Levi suggests, after a moment. "Tell him what you know."

"I don't want to do that to him," Eren mutters. "His dad just died."

Levi can't help but notice that Eren doesn't say 'our dad'. It would have seemed inappropriate if he did, but it just makes him all that much more aware of how fucked up the situation is.

"I don't know, then."

Eren curls closer to his mass of blankets and closes his eyes, and falls asleep.

* * *

"Hey, Mom?"

"Yeah?"

Eren butts a toe against the counter awkwardly, as he watches his mother pull apple fritters out of the oven. They're pretty much his favorite thing about Fourth of July with his family.

"Was there anything…you never told me…about my father?"

His mother stares at him for a moment, confused, until she realizes that he doesn't mean John Ackerman, the man who's been his father since he was eight. Slowly, she takes off her oven mitts and stares at the countertop, either gathering her thoughts or hoping that he forgets he ever asked the question.

"There was a lot I never told you," she says. "Are you referring to something specifically?"

"About…why he left?" He doesn't know how to be delicate about the situation, because he_ does not _want to be the one to tell his mother that the man she was married to for eight years had two families, if she doesn't already know.

"Ah. You'd be referring to…to them, right? The others."

"Yeah. I suppose."

She looks up, and Eren's own eyes stare back at him. She mumbles, "I'm not going to ask how you found out, because I'm pretty sure I know how. The…boy, his son, he…messaged me a few days ago, saying he'd died. Your father. I've been wondering when this would come." She sighs again and unwraps her apron, sets it down on the counter and sits on one of the two stools at the kitchen island counter. Eren has always liked the kitchen of his childhood home, because it's big and always smells good, and a lot of important conversations have taken place at that island. "I want you to know that I never planned on keeping it from you. The chance just never came, and by the time I felt you would understand, you were already old enough to start hating me for not telling you sooner. I figured I would leave well enough alone and let whatever would happen, happen."

"I understand," Eren mumbles.

"About…why he left. I actually know just about as little as you do, about the entire thing. I started having my suspicions when you were a baby, but they were never confirmed. Then one day he told me. That he had another family in…God, I don't even remember now. It was the day he left. He said…his…his _other wife_ made him choose, and he chose them." His mother shrugs. "I never saw him again."

Eren stares at her. Then, almost as if he's thirteen again, he bursts, "I'm glad he's gone. We got along just fine without him. We're happier."

She smiles, and nods. "I think so, too."

Eren never goes looking for that box in the attic, mostly because he's almost sure that his mother probably threw everything belonging to his biological father out, but also because it just doesn't feel right. He keeps the key, though. It's small and silver and finds a home hanging from his neck on a chain.

He's not sure why. Levi theorizes that it's because having it there finally gives him closure, and Eren is tempted to agree with him.

* * *

There is an old tradition that involves freezing a piece of wedding cake and eating it on your first anniversary. Unfortunately, Levi is sly and threw out the piece that Eren froze when they moved apartments, because he thinks it's a disgusting tradition and would go to any lengths necessary to evade it. There was an explosive argument about it. Eren likes to think he won.

Instead of the frozen piece, Eren commissions Sasha to make a tiny version of their original wedding cake, because she's the one that made the first one and Eren's always eager to support a friend's business. He picks it up from her bakery on his way back from lunch with Mikasa, because their anniversary falls on a Tuesday and it's the last Tuesday that he and Mikasa will get to have lunch together for awhile.

She's with Armin now. It's…weird. But a good kind of weird, not the bad kind of weird that it was when she was with Jean. Armin's thankfully grown out of the girlishness he had when they were all teenagers together, and even Eren admits they're kind of a cute couple. It helps that Armin also got into Johns Hopkins.

He has no less than seven texts on his phone that say some version of _Happy anniversary_! It's been a good day.

When he bursts in the door, he does it with energy and vigor. Calls, "Honey! Your amazing husband of exactly one year today is home!"

"Your husband of exactly one year is not impressed," Levi mutters from the sofa, where he's once again in reading glasses. Eren drops the cake onto the kitchen table and opens it and takes it out. It really is small, big enough to feed two people for maybe three sittings if small pieces are cut. It's perfect for the purpose, though.

"I brought cake," Eren informs genially.

"Yay," Levi replies.

"You know, you could at least pretend to be happy today," Eren mutters, half out of some watered-down form of resentment, half because he's occupying himself trying to find a knife. "By the way, I know that dinner before desert is usually the norm, but I had a big lunch and I want cake now." He looks up, to find that Levi isn't in the living room anymore. Confused, he mumbles, "Levi? Uh…babe?"

"Remember what you gave me for Hanukkah?"

Eren hears him before he sees him, but he appears around the kitchen archway a second later, holding a boxed present in his hands. For a second, Eren thinks he's found his carefully-hidden present to Levi—a pair of tickets to _La Boheme_ in French being performed in a one-night engagement in New York in February; it's Levi's favorite opera and Eren had to stay up all night two months ago to get the tickets, which sold out in a matter of minutes—until he realizes that they own the same wrapping paper and some overlap is to be expected.

"Yeah," he says, slowly.

"I had a similar idea," Levi says, and with that cryptic note, he hands the present off to Eren.

It's a photo album, which makes sense considering Levi's earlier words. However, when he opens it, he finds probably the exact opposite of French landscapes.

They're pictures of him. In a way, it appeals to his narcissism, which he indulges in when he's not actively indulging in his equal quantity of self-hatred. But his amount of appreciation for the gift sinks in even further when he realizes what they pictures are _really_ of.

The first one is a picture of Eren in his wedding tux, dancing with his sister. The next is Eren asleep on their overnight flight to Paris, changed drastically from earlier that night, cheek pressed hard against both the window of the plane and his new wedding ring. Then Eren on the balcony of the room they had in Levi's hometown, then a picture of Eren at the bistro they had lunch at several times while in France, and so on and so forth. There are pictures of it all, from Eren carrying boxes into their new apartment to Eren buying supplies for the kittens, of Eren in front of the menorah. There's one that's initially hard to identify before he realizes that it's a picture of himself bungee jumping, seen from high above. There are even a few pictures of Eren sitting by Marco's bedside. They go all the way up to the Fourth of July—a picture of Eren standing between his mother and father over the grill—and yesterday afternoon, a picture of Eren spreading out the mats for their junior intermediate class.

Some of them he thinks he was aware of Levi having taken. Others, the majority in fact, he was completely unaware of.

"These are…" Eren mumbles, flipping back through.

"It's…I don't know. Something I just started doing." Levi shrugs, looking awkward. He's not good at these kinds of things, but it doesn't detract from the situation at all. "It's the entire first year. Of our marriage. I…suppose I didn't want to…forget."

Eren looks up, aware of the fact that he's clutching the album hard to his chest. He says, "Thank you."

"Just imagine," Levi says, tilting his head to the side, "Fifty years' worth of photo albums. Can you?" and he's being sentimental, which he hates, but he finds he doesn't mind for once.

Quickly, Eren nods. "Yeah, I can."

He really, really can. Personally, he can't wait.

* * *

**End**

* * *

WHOA holy shit. This was not supposed to be so long and it was NOT supposed to gain a mind of its own like that.

I hope you enjoy my one shot of novel-length proportions, and I also hope that you enjoyed my characterizations, which I'm sure were flawed considering it's my first time writing SNK, but I at least hope you liked it. There's a noticeable lack of Armin, which I'm disappointed in myself in, but I really struggled involving him in the dynamic of Eren-Levi, an the story suffered for it.

That being said thank you so much for reading!


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